Mumbai: So far as teaching modifications go, Andy Murray mixing into Workforce Novak takes the cake, and it whipped up a lot of chatter heading into the brand new tennis season. Look by the opposite aspect, although, and three of the highest six ladies gamers could have new faces within the coaches’ field on the Australian Open starting Sunday.
USA’s Coco Gauff is now working with coach Matt Daly. (AFP)
World No.2 Iga Swiatek, third-ranked Coco Gauff and No. 6 Elena Rybakina urgent the button for a giant teaching shake-up over the previous few months is sure to brighten the highlight on them and add a layer of intrigue to the ladies’s draw.
The three share seven Slams between them and are the one gamers within the WTA prime 9 aside from world No.1 Aryna Sabalenka to know the texture of profitable Majors. Contrasting circumstances and flips in type by 2024 compelled them to maneuver out of their consolation zone. Rybakina’s case is rather more dramatic, and virtually fittingly entails a Goran Ivanisevic entry, however we’ll get to that in a bit.
Let’s discuss Coco first. Not simply because she seems to be the closest challenger to two-time defending champion Sabalenka in Melbourne, however she’s additionally been the shape participant coming in. A lot of that’s right down to her teaching change.
The American, then in her teenagers, had turned the toast of her nation when she captured the 2023 US Open. All of it went pear-shaped after that for Gauff, who solely managed one WTA 250 title between then and her return to New York for the title defence.
A fourth-round defeat there to compatriot Emma Navarro evidently rattled Gauff. She break up with Brad Gilbert after slightly over a 12 months and introduced within the little-known Matt Daly for a reset. And off they went, tasting instant success on the WTA China Open. Gauff kicked on to change into final 12 months’s WTA Finals champion and lead USA all the way in which on the 2025 United Cup, the place she brushed apart Swiatek.
Some modifications, wish to her grip and serve, have been refined. The large shift has been in her strategy. Gauff’s sport was constructed round unrelenting defence, which she is now courageous sufficient to combine it up with extra proactive assaults.
“Before, I feel like I won a lot of matches just being able to get a lot of balls back. I realised that’s not the way to play if I want to have more success on the tour because girls are hitting harder and harder every day (and) being more aggressive,” Gauff mentioned.
If the US Open was Gauff’s set off for a revamp, it was the Paris Olympics for Swiatek. The runaway world No.1 and favorite for gold was shocked within the semi-final. That stung, and began a downward spiral for the remainder of the season through which Sabalenka dethroned her.
Whereas Gauff was fast together with her shuffle, the Pole took loads of time to zero down on changing her long-time coach Tomasz Wiktorowski. In got here Wim Fissette, whose physique of teaching work features a few former world No.1s in Naomi Osaka, Victoria Azarenka and Simona Halep, amongst others. Their affiliation has fetched combined outcomes to this point, nevertheless it’s clear Swiatek realised she needed to do one thing totally different regardless of being prime ranked for a big a part of 2024.
“If you’re not going to evolve in tennis, the other girls are going to come after you and suddenly you’ll wake up as being, I don’t know, outside of the top 50 or something,” Swiatek informed fellow professional Caroline Garcia in her Tennis Insider Membership podcast.
Rybakina continues to be very a lot within the prime 50 (sixth, in truth) regardless of taking part in simply 15 tournaments final 12 months. Accidents and sickness saved the 2022 Wimbledon champion extra off the courtroom than on it, and even there she appeared a shadow of herself. And her teaching state of affairs continues to be gray.
Rybakina break up together with her long-time coach Stefano Vukov days earlier than the US Open, earlier than roping in Ivanisevic — the maverick former Wimbledon champion who most lately coached Novak Djokovic — for this season. This month, Rybakina introduced Vukov would re-join her group, just for the WTA to disclose that Vukov was provisionally suspended pending investigation for a possible breach of conduct. Murmurs about Rybakina and Vukov’s troubled working relationship had been swirling round final 12 months, though the previous maintains he “never mistreated” her.
In all this, coach Ivanisevic is reportedly taking part in wait and watch. And watch we will too, in what the teaching shake-ups brings to those prime contenders in Australia.
EOM